Mini doodle potty training issue...

[Jenny Zeng]

I have a mini golden doodle, who's 5 and a half month old. He's been "potty trained" as of a month ago, in the sense that he knows to go to the door and ring the bell when he needs to potty. However, if he does it a few times, and we don't let him out, he'll just go to where we're not watching and potty. Also, if he's in another room with no access to the bell, he'll also just potty without giving us much warning.

He almost never potties when he's home alone (for usually 9 hours a day), so he definitely can hold his bladder if he wants to, but he just doens't know or doesn't want to hold it when we're around. We of course throw a party when he goes outside to potty, and give him a firm scolding and take him outside right away when he goes inside and we catch him.

The sizes of the potty indoors also isn't huge, so he definitely can hold it if he wants to. It's not an UTI concern either, since he obviously has the ability to hold it when he's home alone. How can we teach him that he needs to hold it if he's not outside, even when we're around?

[Ginny Nightingale]

I would say that he is regressing a bit--he WAS potty trained and is now testing his limits--try to go back to a schedule--taking him out every few hours when you are home--instead of relying totally on him...he is now a teenager and is aware that he does not really have to follow rules! Back to square one!

[Stephanie and Ragley]

Is there a reason you are not letting him out when he rings the bells multiple times?

[Jenny Zeng]

Typically it's when I'm in a meeting, or if our hands are dirty with cooking or dishes. There's at most 5 minutes between when he rings the bell to when he just pees inside.

As for the teenage stage, his puppy trainer did say that he's about age when that starts to happen...guess he's rebelling a bit =/. Should I still be pen training him then? He gained free run of the house once we trusted him to ring the bell, but maybe it's time to put him back in the pen if we can't let him out, or he can't have access to the bell...

[F, Calla & Luca]

I do think you should put him in a pen or crate him if you can't let him out. My dogs are able to understand , "you have to wait", although we never did bells. But I think your doodle is too young for that. If you ignore him when he rings the bell that undoes some of his training and frustrates him.

[Ginny Nightingale]

I agree, F!

[Natalie & Banjo]

Agree here as well. He's done well for 5 months but for reinforcement purposes would suggest responding to the bell right away at this age. If he starts abusing it for non potty times, that's a different issue. Not positively reinforcing the bell in a fast response can be misunderstood by him as tacit approval that eliminating outside is not a present requirement by the master in this current situation. And he really does want to please you. While testing boundaries is at play too, I wonder if he might just not know the rule of the moment.

He understands other situations b/c the rules and responses are consistent. This one may seem inconsistent to him.

If you can't reciprocate right away, then he needs to understand your wait command, which can be hard at this stage. Don't get discouraged.

A.

[Ginny Nightingale]

Most people wait a year before a dog has free run of the house and sometimes it is longer--for some reason, I know a lot of people with small dogs who do this same thing and once it becomes a habit, it is very hard to break! So, make some changes now...

[Jenny Zeng]

Ah i see. Thanks everyone! This has been very helpful. We'll respond faster to him ringing the bell and put him in the pen if he can't access the bell.

One other question though, what if he does abuse the bell? He does sometimes rings the bell just to potty a tiny little bit outside, which I'm convinced is his way of getting our attention. How should we treat that? We've been letting him out, and if he doesn't potty, we just leave him outside. I've been told that we should let him inside again and ignore him, but when we tried that, he'd just ring the bell again.

[Natalie & Banjo]

Don't have a great answer for that one. In our home, we've come to accept that bells mean basically, ' I want to go out there'. It's usually potty but it can also be a squirrel he sees from the window. We follow the mental clock of if he's due and it's usually accurate. But sometimes he wants to lounge on the deck and will let us know with the bells. For our guy, his body language and the way he rings them can differ too. You'll hopefully get a better tip from the others : )

[Willow and J]

Willow used to sit in front of the door when she wanted to go out, to pottie, but more often to play. Inevitably we were subjected under this form of "abuse", but we let her out whenever she sat at the door for the consistency's sake. I don't know about ignoring the puppy after a "fake" trip, but in my experience, punishment doesn't work as well at puppy stage. (To this day, Willow still doesn't understand "ignoring" very well. She'd just work harder to get our attention.) Reward works much better, and we made sure we praise her if she potties. 

[Sally S Miles]

I don't use the bells, just eye contact and insistence - however, I agree that teaching him to use the bells and ignoring it are part of the problem.  Containment is needed, five minutes can seem like a long time when you have to go - option is to go back to square one and time it all out.  Once this cycle of asking to go out gets whacked, it's hard to get back on - five months is young, impressionable.

We did not give our girl run on the house until after her spay - so last year at nine months she was footloose.  Little guy is way sharper, but we had a couple times when I got swamped and he peed by the back door - my fault, not his.  He has run of the house now, and he is almost nine months old.  Both dogs are supervised out the wazoo - but little guy in the past month has stopped the pee every time we go out, to determining when he wants to go or not. This is mostly good, as he matured the span increased - bladder capacity and control come with practice.

Hang in there.

[BG and Gavin]

I agree with others feedback - like a child they have not learned to have a long delay in getting their needs met.  It will come.  The other thing I wanted to add it that he can hold it longer when he is home alone because he is in a resting state (like overnight).